Childhood at Court, 1819-1914 by John Van der Kiste Read Free Book Online Page B

Princess was not so well. By late summer she was unable to digest her food, lost weight, cut her teeth with difficulty, and cried a great deal. The blame was largely laid at the door of Mrs Southey, a hypochondriac who was rather too fond of cheese and beer. Dr Clark’s remedy for the baby was ‘soothing medicine’, a solution containing laudanum, which made her pale and lethargic.
    At that time drugs, medicines and restoratives were prescribed for children to an extent which seems to have bordered on the reckless. Doctors frequently recommended wine, and nurses were liberal in making their young charges take pills or powder, a dose of brimstone and treacle, castor oil, liquorice, or a spoonful of Godfrey’s cordial. The latter was a mixture of laudanum and syrup, easily purchased from any chemist over the counter, and an effective tranquillizer, reducing children to stupefaction for hours on end. Sometimes the hours were, literally, endless. According to a report of 1844, ‘great numbers of children perish, either suddenly from an overdose, or, as more commonly happens, slowly, painfully and insidiously.’ 8 A few households had the sense to ban ‘Godfrey’s cordial’, but less wisely mixed large quantities of gin with their children’s milk.
    The Queen’s second pregnancy was more difficult than her first, and her state of depression was exacerbated by Pussy’s problems. ‘Till the end of August she was such a magnificent, strong fat child,’ she noted with concern, ‘that it is a great grief to see her so thin, pale and changed.’ 9 Dr Clark suggested various changes to her diet to make her put on weight; asses’ milk and chicken broth, cream in her cereal, and butter on her rusks, were all tried. The resulting mixture was so rich for her that she became more sick than ever, and still lost weight.
    By this time the Queen’s confinement was approaching. Twice during October the doctors thought she might give birth prematurely. On 9 November, at 10.50 p.m., ‘a fine large boy’ was born. The Queen admitted in her journal (2 December) that ‘my sufferings were really very severe, and I don’t know what I should have done, but for the great comfort and support my beloved Albert was to me.’ 10 Pussy was ‘terrified & not at all pleased with her little brother’. 11
    The new heir to the throne was created Prince of Wales on 4 December 1841, and christened Albert Edward in St George’s Chapel, Windsor, on 25 January 1842. Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus was played on the organ, and the Duke of Wellington carried the Sword of State. Lord Melbourne, writing on 1 December, approved the choice of his maternal grandfather’s name; ‘ Edward is a good English appellation, and has a certain degree of popularity attached to it from ancient recollections.’ 12
    The Queen was delighted with her eldest son; ‘our little boy is a wonderfully strong and large child, with very large dark blue eyes, a finely formed but somewhat large nose, and a pretty little mouth; I hope and pray he may be like his dearest Papa.’ 13 From the first, he enjoyed perfect health and ‘crowing spirits’, with none of his sister’s digestive problems.
    Prince Albert was sure that slackness and ignorance among the nursery staff were almost entirely responsible for his daughter’s ill-health; and Lehzen, he maintained, was the chief culprit. He resented her for her possessive attitude towards the Queen, and though no admirer of the Conroy, who had long since been ‘persuaded to retire’, never forgave her for coming between the Queen and the Duchess of Kent, who had long since become reconciled. He had no faith either in Dr Clark, who he knew only told the Queen what she wanted to hear and – Albert suspected – supplemented his salary with secret payments from the firms which supplied the expensive medicines and diets he prescribed. Baron Christian von Stockmar, a physician from Coburg who also served as confidential adviser and